Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough has dealt Democrats a potential setback in their legislative agenda after she ruled that just one more automatic budget reconciliation is allowed this year.
That process allows Democrats to circumvent the filibuster, which essentially creates a 60 vote threshold for most legislation. Democrats were hoping to use the process known as budget reconciliation to pass legislation with a simple majority or just 51 votes.
However, before senators can vote on a reconciliation bill, it has to be discharged from the Senate Budget Committee.
As The Hill reports, “MacDonough ruled that a revision to the 2021 budget resolution cannot be automatically discharged from the Senate Budget Committee, meaning Democrats would need at least one Republican on the 11-11 panel to vote with them.”
The reconciliation measure would also have to have floor amendment votes. Additionally, MacDonough said that there would have to be an economic reason for using reconciliation again.
That means it is unlikely that Democrats would be able to use reconciliation more than once per year until after the midterm elections if they pick up more seats in the Senate and they have a majority on the Budget Committee to approve using budget reconciliation multiple times.
CNN’s Manu Raju noted that Democrats were, in practice, not likely to use budget reconciliation again before the fall as lawmakers are still negotiating Biden’s infrastructure bill.
Democrats already used the automatic budget reconciliation process once this year to pass Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package.
“The ruling will NOT prevent Democrats from attempting to use the budget process again in the next fiscal year, which begins October 1,” Raju added.
Senate’s parliamentarian has ruled that there are clear limits to how senators use the filibuster-proof budget reconciliation process multiple times per fiscal year, per ruling provided by a source. There must be compelling economic reason + would have to go through full process
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) June 2, 2021
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) hoped that Democrats could use reconciliation two or three more times this year to pass President Joe Biden’s $2.3 trillion American Jobs Plan or $1.8 trillion American Families Plan.
MacDonough gave Democrats hope earlier this year that they could use reconciliation more than once to pass legislation after she ruled that reconciliation could be used multiple times.
However, at the time, a spokesperson for Schumer noted that “some parameters still need to be worked out.” The need for a Republican vote on the committee will likely present a roadblock for Democrats in their hopes of side-stepping the filibuster multiple times.
Democrats would have to pass one larger budget reconciliation bill instead of several smaller bills to accomplish their agenda this year.
However, what is included in the reconciliation bill is typically dependent upon what the parliamentarian says can be passed through that process.
Whatever is not approved to be in the reconciliation bill would have to wait until next year when a budget reconciliation bill for the fiscal year 2023 is automatically discharged, according to The Hill.
While senators could fire the parliamentarian, and the vice president can overrule her, such a move is rare.
